Frank

Possibly a Jamaican pressing

Mine is identical too, the only difference is the drill hole is 3mm to the left! I've always assumed it to be a demo in spite of the dh and had never noticed the pink tinge until now.

Try here https://www.bigboppa.co.uk/45-sleeves/index.html

It is the same group as "Time Will Change" as they both have the same flip "Lonely Lover". 100% agree about "Look Out Love" every time I hear it, it sounds better!

I'm no expert on UK EMI releases but I believe the last number on the matrix stamp denotes the press, so if it finishes with a 1 it is the first press, a 3 would be the third and so on. A lot of records were pressed more than once and kept on the catalogue for a long time without being actual reissues. I don't know if this applies to any other UK labels.

I've only found 2 copies of Marcia Hines here in Oz and not found another this century, I've no idea why it is so rare. I swapped my double for an Ivorys (Despenza) and a Ringleaders BWHTOL with a UK dealer, maybe that gives you an idea of value! So I'd take a dozen at £100 each, much rarer than Gloria Scott.

I think there are a couple in Australia

Vinyl or styrene? What's in the dead wax? If it is styrene it will probably be a monarch pressing so there should be a delta number, if it is vinyl it may just have a hand written matrix whether real or not. However the LP came out in 69 and the number would put it years later so it seems highly unlikely to have been issued. Lovely looking boot though!

Fooled me for a while too. I believe Festival pressed all their own vinyl in Sydney and the K series 45's look the same, different to RCA, EMI and CBS (Aristocrat) pressings, although similar to Astor pressings that were pressed in Melbourne. There is a wiki entry with a brief history of the company. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festival_Records

The Bob Kuban is a bootleg, quite an oddity really as they didn't seem to do a lot of bootlegging in Australia, I've been told it had something to do with Dixons records in Blackburn (Victoria not Lancs) and they also did a similar boot of Tony Pass "Spring Fever". The sound quality on all the copies I've had is poor. BTW Stateside was never part of the Festival group of labels, but you know that Mal!

Yes, they are identical.

Vicki Williams 'your love makes me stay when i know i should go' on Big Beat?

There were also 3 different sleeves to the PDD release, the first was given away as a promotion before the record was released and the front cover had the group as "Chosen Few", when it was eventually released they overprinted "Wigans" in red to read "Wigans Chosen Few" and the final sleeve was simply "Wigans Chosen Few". I've still got the first two, but not the record!

That label scan is of an Australian release, not a US copy. I doubt that it would have sold a single copy so quite rare. Cheers, Frank

Picked up a spare copy of this album today and gave it a spin, haven't heard it for a few years. I'm pretty sure most of the vocal tracks are Chris Bartley, but for me the best track "What Kind Of Man" almost certainly isn't. I'm pretty sure it isn't Van McCoy singing as his style is very MOR on most of his records and the only soulful record, "Let Me Down Easy", I have by him has no vocal similarity. So after a bit of investigating I'm leaning towards it being Oscar Weathers who cut a few tracks on Top & Bottom with Van McCoy.